What the court actually ruled
The Rechtbank Den Haag ruling of 28 September 2026 came out of a joint action by three licensed Dutch operators challenging an enforcement letter the KSA had sent in early 2026. The letter treated affiliate comparison pages that appeared in organic Google results as 'untargeted advertising' under Article 2a of the Besluit werving, reclame en verslavingspreventie kansspelen, triggering the Article 4a 18+ obligation.
The court rejected that reading. Judge C. van der Meer wrote that affiliate pages hosted outside the operator's control and selected by a user searching unambiguously for casino content do not meet the legal definition of 'untargeted' advertising aimed at the general public. The decision applies only to organic-search affiliate traffic, not to paid placements or display networks.
The case, step by step
KSA opened the file in February 2026 after a GGD-funded report flagged that a CRUKS-registered player had reached a licensed operator's deposit page by clicking through two affiliate hops. KSA then wrote to 17 licensed operators demanding they terminate commercial relationships with affiliates whose pages 'remain reachable' via Dutch search queries.
Three operators, understood to be Holland Casino Online, bet365 Netherlands and Toto, pushed back and filed for review. The hearing took three sittings across July and September. The deciding question was whether a static affiliate page qualifies as 'advertising' at all, or whether it is editorial content the regulator is asking operators to police indirectly.
The KSA planned appeal
KSA confirmed on 7 October that it will take the case to the Raad van State, the Dutch administrative appeals court, with a hearing unlikely before Q2 2027. In a short statement, the regulator said the ruling 'risks creating a two-track enforcement system, one for direct advertising and one for affiliate intermediation, which was not the policy intent of the 2021 reform.'
A KSA spokesperson told Flinke that enforcement letters already issued will not be withdrawn pending the appeal, but no new enforcement under the same theory will be opened. Operators that had paused affiliate deals in Q2 are watching the appeal before deciding whether to switch programmes back on.
What Dutch operators are saying
The Nederlandse Online Gambling Associatie called the ruling 'a correction, not a licence to flood the market.' NOGA's position is that the targeted-channel-marketing regime introduced in July 2023 already covers the player-protection concern, and layering affiliate rules on top duplicates obligations without measurable harm reduction.
Operator-side lawyers are now split on how aggressively to restart affiliate programmes. Several have told us they will wait for the Raad van State hearing before signing any new deals, since a reversed ruling would re-open the enforcement exposure retroactively.
CRUKS edge cases the ruling opens
The practical edge case is a CRUKS-registered player who clicks through to a licensed operator's page via an affiliate. The operator has to block the account creation at the identity check, but the court has now said the preceding affiliate hop is not within the operator's compliance perimeter.
That matters because it removes one layer of the defence the KSA had built around CRUKS. The register still works at the point of account creation, but the funnel upstream of it is no longer regulated under the advertising rulebook. Player-protection groups have asked Parliament to look at whether a direct affiliate regime is now needed.
What changes for Dutch players
In the short term, not much. Licensed Dutch operators will continue to enforce CRUKS, run 24/7 KYC and cap bonuses under the existing framework. Players searching in Dutch should still expect to land on licensed brands first, since the ranking logic has not changed.
The medium-term question is whether Dutch comparison and review pages, including ours, will have more visibility inside Netherlands search results. If the appeal fails, affiliate pages become more viable and the Dutch market landscape gets more transparent at the comparison layer. If the appeal succeeds, we are back where we were in Q1 2026.
Frequently asked questions
Did the court strike down the Dutch advertising ban?
No. The ban on untargeted gambling advertising stays in place. The court only narrowed what counts as 'untargeted' to exclude organic-search affiliate pages.
Does this affect CRUKS?
CRUKS itself is unchanged. The register is still enforced at account creation. What changed is that the advertising-level obligations no longer reach affiliate pages a CRUKS-listed player might see upstream.
Will the KSA appeal?
Yes. The KSA confirmed on 7 October that it will take the case to the Raad van State. A ruling is not expected before Q2 2027.
Can I expect more casino bonuses in the Netherlands?
Not directly from this ruling. The targeted-channel rules on bonuses and the welcome-offer cap from the 2023 reform still bind every licensed operator.
Olivia Clarke
Olivia Clarke runs Flinke's UK and Ireland desk and edits the newsroom. Nine years deep in the regulated British market, she tests every operator we rank by signing up as any player would, running real deposits through the cashier, and timing withdrawals from click to cleared funds.
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